Pathways to Housing

It’s hard not to notice homelessness when you live in a big city like Chicago. I can’t even leave my apartment without seeing a panhandler–there’s one guy who is always sitting in front of the Starbucks down the street during the day and in front of the Hooters next door at night. I don’t give him money because I don’t think that it helps solve the root of the problem, but I often think about what would be an effective solution. Pathways to Housing is a non-profit organization that seems to have it figured out. They’re based in New York, NY with offices in Burlington, VT; Washington, DC: and Philadelphia, PA, and they’ve taken a “housing first” approach that is focused on “addressing homelessness among people with psychiatric disabilities.” In other words, they provide housing before any other services, and they’ve found that this is a far more effective way to attack the root causes of homelessness.

Where Does Your Pathway Lead?

If you give a person a home, they’ll quite obviously no longer be homeless. But you won’t have really solved anything. However, Pathways to Housing has found that providing housing first makes it far easier to offer “supportive treatment services in the areas of mental and physical health, substance abuse, education, and employment.” It’s a counterintuitive model, but it seems to work. You can read more about it and how it’s now being used all over the world here. If you like what Pathways to Housing is doing, you’ll want to check out their Work with Us page. For some reason their Job Openings link won’t work for me, but you can check out their current postings on Idealist or try using our job search engine. There are some entry level Assistant and Coordinator type positions.